It's a dark, cold night on the side of a busy road with cars speeding by, just a number of feet away. Police lights flash across your peripheral vision. No moon in sight. No street lights. What's going on? Just your freedom is being tested. And it will depend on how well you do these DUI Field Sobriety Tests. Here come a bunch of complicated instructions you've never heard before. You're about to try some things you've never done before. The noise and lights continue. You're nervous. You're shaking from the chill of the night. Are you raising your arms for balance? Are you putting your foot down? In the event you did just any 2 of these "errors" or purported failures to perform as instructed, a drunk driving investigative officer will likely conclude "with 65% accuracy" as stipulated in a pseudo-science of impairment diagnostics, that you are too under the influence of alcohol (and/or drugs) to drive.
Were you bending your leg? Did you stare straight ahead instead of keeping your eyes at your foot? Did you start too soon? If you did, California DUI cops are trained to conclude impaired subjects may have trouble following instructions. This 1 leg stand is one of the 3 "scientifically"-researched standardized field sobriety tests (SFST's) sanctioned by NHTSA, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. DUI officers assume it's some kind of "holy grail" as they expediently use these tests to support a decision to arrest a subject for drunk driving. NHTSA claimed cops utilizing scores from all 3 tests would be 91% accurate in making a DUI arrest, whatever that meant. NHTSA maintained the most accurate of the 3 SFST's is the horizontal gaze nystagmus or "jerking eyeball" test. This is when the cop holds a penlight or small flashlight in front of you, then asks you to track it visually from side to side. If you've had too much alcohol, your eyeballs will supposedly start shaking about 45 degrees from center.
NHTSA's 2 other tests, the 1-leg stand and Walk and Turn (nine steps forward and back on a straight line) are called "divided attention" tests since they require both mental concentration and physical coordination. The 1-leg stand has plenty of skeptics and challenges in court, but the test is "easily performed by most unimpaired people," NHTSA claims. What did DUI cops do before that? look at this site were "on their own." A few tossed a bunch of coins on the ground, instructing the subject to only pick up nickels or quarters. Other cops had drivers lean back and touch one finger to his or her nose; recite the alphabet without singing the alphabet song; count backward from 100 by 3's. They would chat a bit before making a judgmental guess. But how were you going to tell if a driver was impaired that way? These were kind of weird things. 1975 came along and NHTSA gathered proposals to try to develop a valid standardized test.
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Marcelline Burns and Southern California Research Institute in Los Angeles secured the bid. 238 volunteers from the local unemployment office promptly volunteered. Basically any one who was over 21 who claimed they had a driver's license and who claimed they like to drink a few alcoholic beverages. They earned a respectable $3 a day. Back at the lab, cocktails were flowing. The "subjects" were "dosed" with either a placebo of orange juice or a screwdriver (orange juice with vodka). Then they went into small rooms. Ten cops were in there. The officers had at their disposal a number of acrobatics, totaling 6 purported "sobriety" tests. The cops thereafter made a determination as to a DUI/Drunk Driving arrest or not. 1977 - the final report was ultimately published with recommendations to employ the present battery of the 3 tests. However, Marcelline failed to test the "drunk" subjects when sober to see how well they really could balance on 1 leg. Uh oh. "The evidence that it's an easy task comes from the placebo people," she offered. Most of the subjects were men, ages 22 to 29. Think the placebo people appeared much to like most Americans?
It's a dark, cold night on the side of a busy road with cars speeding by, just a number of feet away. Police lights flash across your peripheral vision. No moon in sight. No street lights. What's going on? Just your freedom is being tested. And it will depend on how well you do these DUI Field Sobriety Tests. Here come a bunch of complicated instructions you've never heard before. You're about to try some things you've never done before. The noise and lights continue. You're nervous. You're shaking from the chill of the night. Are you raising your arms for balance? Are you putting your foot down? In the event you did just any 2 of these "errors" or purported failures to perform as instructed, a drunk driving investigative officer will likely conclude "with 65% accuracy" as stipulated in a pseudo-science of impairment diagnostics, that you are too under the influence of alcohol (and/or drugs) to drive.
Were you bending your leg? Did you stare straight ahead instead of keeping your eyes at your foot? Did you start too soon? If you did, California DUI cops are trained to conclude impaired subjects may have trouble following instructions. This 1 leg stand is one of the 3 "scientifically"-researched standardized field sobriety tests (SFST's) sanctioned by NHTSA, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. DUI officers assume it's some kind of "holy grail" as they expediently use these tests to support a decision to arrest a subject for drunk driving. NHTSA claimed cops utilizing scores from all 3 tests would be 91% accurate in making a DUI arrest, whatever that meant. NHTSA maintained the most accurate of the 3 SFST's is the horizontal gaze nystagmus or "jerking eyeball" test. This is when the cop holds a penlight or small flashlight in front of you, then asks you to track it visually from side to side. If you've had too much alcohol, your eyeballs will supposedly start shaking about 45 degrees from center.
NHTSA's 2 other tests, the 1-leg stand and Walk and Turn (nine steps forward and back on a straight line) are called "divided attention" tests since they require both mental concentration and physical coordination. The 1-leg stand has plenty of skeptics and challenges in court, but the test is "easily performed by most unimpaired people," NHTSA claims. What did DUI cops do before that? look at this site were "on their own." A few tossed a bunch of coins on the ground, instructing the subject to only pick up nickels or quarters. Other cops had drivers lean back and touch one finger to his or her nose; recite the alphabet without singing the alphabet song; count backward from 100 by 3's. They would chat a bit before making a judgmental guess. But how were you going to tell if a driver was impaired that way? These were kind of weird things. 1975 came along and NHTSA gathered proposals to try to develop a valid standardized test.
This article was generated by Essay Writers!
Marcelline Burns and Southern California Research Institute in Los Angeles secured the bid. 238 volunteers from the local unemployment office promptly volunteered. Basically any one who was over 21 who claimed they had a driver's license and who claimed they like to drink a few alcoholic beverages. They earned a respectable $3 a day. Back at the lab, cocktails were flowing. The "subjects" were "dosed" with either a placebo of orange juice or a screwdriver (orange juice with vodka). Then they went into small rooms. Ten cops were in there. The officers had at their disposal a number of acrobatics, totaling 6 purported "sobriety" tests. The cops thereafter made a determination as to a DUI/Drunk Driving arrest or not. 1977 - the final report was ultimately published with recommendations to employ the present battery of the 3 tests. However, Marcelline failed to test the "drunk" subjects when sober to see how well they really could balance on 1 leg. Uh oh. "The evidence that it's an easy task comes from the placebo people," she offered. Most of the subjects were men, ages 22 to 29. Think the placebo people appeared much to like most Americans?